Take back your time 2020 - Move time around

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of I Heart Radio.
Good Morning, This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Today's Tip is the fourth in a five part series
on how to take control of your time in the
new year. This week, I'll be talking about five strategies

(00:23):
that I know will help you feel less busy and
get more done because they've definitely helped me. The first
tip was to track your time. The second was to
figure out what you'd like to spend an hour more
doing per week. The third was to treat your priorities
with the urgency you'd give to actual emergencies. And the
fourth is to move time around. Yes, sometimes of day

(00:49):
are better suited to some things than others, but by
being flexible about when things happen, you can build a
full life even if you have an intense job or
family responsibilities. Many people who track their time are surprised
to discover that they do have leisure time. The problem

(01:11):
is that this leisure time often occurs at times that
are harder to seize. And we might want to write
the Great American novel, but when you get the kids
down at eight thirty pm, Netflix looks a lot more appealing.
Than cranking out a rough draft. And sometimes we have
stories of when is the right time for things, and
if these right times don't fit in our lives, we

(01:33):
give up. I see this all the time from couples
who'd like to do regular dates, but getting a Saturday
night sitter is tough, so they give up. Or people
decide that family dinner is the sign of a functioning
family and feel bad when work and activity schedules preclude
it most week days. People who need to log long
hours at work assume that they just won't see young

(01:55):
kids who go to bed early during the week, or
they won't be able to play on a softball team
that me it's on Tuesday evenings. But when we choose
to be time management masters who moved time around, none
of these need to be big problems. For instance, if
you know you can't be creative at night, well don't
be creative at night. Try going to bed a little

(02:17):
bit earlier, waking up a little bit earlier, and writing.
Then magically you've turned unproductive evening hours into productive morning
hours just by moving time around. A couple, time doesn't
only have to happen on Saturday night. Maybe both of
you cut out of work a little early and meet
for a quick happy hour some day before us six

(02:38):
pm daycare pickup. Or maybe you both work from home
on Fridays, so you schedule a long lunch break during
this time where your kids are already in school. You
put the kids in simultaneous karate classes on Saturday mornings
and go grab coffee together. Then no Saturday night babysitting required.
As for family dinner, I encourage people to think about

(03:01):
family meals instead. Maybe everyone gets up and has breakfast together.
A weekend launch totally counts, so does pizza altogether on
Sunday nights. It doesn't have to be a pot roast
at six pm on Tuesdays. And as for weeknight leisure
or family time, maybe you can move your work hours

(03:21):
around two. If you want to practice with the softball
team at six thirty pm on Tuesdays, you arrange to
leave work by five pm that night. Now the work
doesn't go away, but after your game is done at
nine pm, you log back on and do the work
you would have done between five and seven thirty from

(03:42):
nine pm. This way, you're trading off work time for
TV time as opposed to work time for your softball time,
and that's a tradeoff you might be more interested in making.
By being flexible about when things happen, we can build
the lives we want even with very constraints. So today,

(04:03):
think about what activities you'd like to build into your life.
Ask if you might make space by being creative. A
twenty minute jog on the basement treadmill three nights a
week after the kids go to bed might not seem
like an ideal solution, but if the alternative is not
exercising at all, it can still feel pretty good. And

(04:23):
then you can watch your Netflix guilt free. So how
will you move time around? What will you do at
an unorthodox time? You can let me know Before Breakfast
podcast at i heeart media dot com. In the meantime,
this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making
the most of our time. Hey, everybody, I'd love to

(04:52):
hear from you. You can send me your tips, your questions,
or anything else. Just connect with me on Twitter, Facebook
and Instagram at Before Breakfast pod that's B the number
four then Breakfast p o D. You can also shoot
me an email at Before Breakfast podcast at iHeartMedia dot

(05:12):
com that Before Breakfast is spelled out with all the letters.
Thanks so much, I look forward to staying in touch.
Before Breakfast is a production of I heart Radio. For
more podcasts from I heart Radio, visit the i heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your

(05:33):
favorite shows.